Objectives

This paper presents the background and rationale for a composite indicator, healthy life-year (HeaLY), that incoporates mortality and morbidity into a qingle number, HeaLY is compared with the disability-adjusted life-year (DALY) indicator, to demonstrate the relative simplicity and ease of use of the former.

Methods

Data collected by the Ghana Health Assessment team from census records, death certificates, medical records, and special studies were used to create a spreedsheet.

HeaLys lost as a result of premature mortality and disability from 56 conditions were estimated.

Results

Two thirds of HeaLYs lost in Ghana were from maternal and communicable diseases and were largely preventable.

The age weighting in DALYs leads to a higher value placed on deaths at younger ages than in HeaLYs.

This spredsheet can be used as a template for assessing changges in health status attribuable to interventions.